Venturing into the Unexpected
by erttheking
Summary: What is supposed to be another routine planet exploration for SG-1 takes a turn for the unexpected and bizarre when they find a planet that defies all previous expectations. Patreon sponsored one-shot


Another day another planet. Truth be told there wasn't anything particular that stuck out to Colonel Jack O'Neil about this one, aside from the fact that a lush green forest on a pleasantly sunny day was a more welcoming destination than he had expected. Indeed, the planet RXQ-205, would not have attracted any significant attention beyond another box to be checked if it wasn't for one, curious factor. When SGC had first attempted to open the Stargate to this planet, it had failed. This was hardly unheard of, it was what happened when a Stargate was buried. The usual assumption was that the locals had rebelled against the Gou'ald and driven them off-world before cutting off access. Every once in awhile though, SGC went back through gates they had failed to connect to and attempted another connection, To everyone's surprise, they had been able to open a gate to RXQ-205 this time. So, SG-1 had been given very simple orders. Saddle up, head on through, figure out what had changed.

The Stargate for RXQ-205 had been in a cave, one with a massive amount of loose rocks, that opened onto a large forest that stretched out as far as the eye could see. Here and there, delipidated ruins stood amongst the trees, tiny things that looked as if they had once been part of something much bigger. "Daniel?" he asked. Their resident archeologist was poking over one of the closer ruins, one within a stone's throw of the Stargate. "Find anything?"

He pushed away from the building, giving Jack a smile that told him that he was about to hear a lot about matters he cared for very little. "Oh yeah. If I had to take a guess, I'd say this architecture is a mixture of Greek and Celtic. The implications here are immense, maybe a potential intertwining of Earth cultures into a sort of hybrid. It's hard to say, I'll have to take a closer look to-"

"Daniel, I'm sure there are plenty of people back on Earth that'll be fascinated to hear all about that," Jack said, only mildly irritated at his colleague's diverted attention. "But do we have anything on if people are living here? And what caused the Stargate to be buried?"

"Uh, right," he said. "Well I looked around the Stargate and I think the explanation might be simple. I think it was just a rockslide that buried the gate."

Jack blinked. Then he looked back inside the cave. Teal'c and Sam were both crouched around the Stargate, picking up loose rocks and tossing them towards the back of the cave. Enough were piled up in the back of the room to utterly bury the Stargate, having been there since they had arrived. The DHD had been buried under a pile of them and they would need to excavate it to complete the trip home. Even now, they were only halfway done. He looked back at Daniel. "That's it?"

Daniel shrugged. "I don't think this one was built in the best position. My guess? An earthquake or something caused a good portion of the cave's roof to collapse. Something recent must've shifted them all to the back of the cave and let us dial into this planet."

Jack couldn't help but find this all rather underwhelming. Granted, he knew that not every planet could be some source of Goa'uld cruelty or with some deep, dark secret, but this was all astonishingly mundane. "And any sign of people living within a hundred miles of this place?"

"I'm still looking around," Daniel said, turning his attention back to the ruin he had been examining. It wasn't a particularly big building, one room, one story, and was missing two of its four walls. The rocks it was made out of were a dull gray, formed into pillars that held up what was left of the roof. Daniel was now going over one of the pillars with a brush. Then he stops. "Colonel?" He reached into a nook the pillar with a gloved hand and pulled something out, holding it up to the light. Jack approached him, taking a look at it.

It was a bullet. Not a run of the mill bullet either, it was a damn big one. He whistled. "Unless I'm getting rusty, that's a fifty cal," he said. He hadn't seen one of those since the Gulf War. "They saved these things for the Browning and anti-material rifles. You shoot anyone with this, they ain't getting up again." The pillar where Daniel had found the round was cracked, spiderwebbing out from the bullet's entrance point. It looked about right for a bullet of that caliber. "This is new. We haven't found anyone out there that uses good old fashioned guns before. Any idea how long that's been here?"

"Considering how loose a lot of the masonry is?" Daniel said. He stuck a finger in the bullet hole and wiggled it around a bit. Bits and pieces of the inside of the pillar came loose, scattering onto the ground. "Not very long ago. I'd even go so far as to say it's been less than a week. If it had been a month or longer, the wind would've blown away loose bits of debris by now."

"Ok," Jack said, a picture starting to form in his head. For once, it was a picture that he liked. "So we've got a planet that was only recently connected to the Stargate system and has a people that's advanced enough that they're shooting fifty caliber bullets around. In other words, people that might be able to put up a fight against the Goa'uld. More so than most of the planets we've visited."

"Maybe," Daniel said. "This is only one part of a much bigger picture. The planet as a whole might not be on a unified tech level, or maybe this is an experimental weapon. Hard to say without further study. What I'd like to know is what made someone shoot a weapon that big." He stepped away from the pillar before kneeling on the ground. "I'm not seeing any signs of blood or other telltale signs of a firefight. I'm sure if I were to look around we'd find some bullet casings, I don't think any planet out there has invented the muzzle-loaded anti-tank rifle yet. But it's a bit weird just finding it all by itself."

"It doesn't look like a training area, we don't exactly have basic training in the coliseum," Jack said, looking around himself. He paused. There were deep grooves on the floor, a trio of them. They looked suspiciously like bear claws. "Daniel, any chance that bullet came from a big game hunter? Like maybe someone came out here to kill an animal that's been eating people?"

Daniel's eyes focused on the grooves with a familiarity that suggested that he had seen them already. "Maybe," he said. "It'd make some sense. Though even then I feel like there should be some blood. Or at the very least some other kind of animal marking, like bird feathers, or excrement."

"Charming," Jack said dryly, Daniel not taking his eyes off of the floor. "Look, here's a theory that might explain the lack of blood. Now I warn you, it's a complex and multi-layered one. Winnie the Pooh comes in here, lost because he can't remember the way to Rabbit's. Our shooter takes aim and misses. Our bear of very little brain gets spooked and runs off." He held up his hands. "That's it."

Daniel looked mildly amused. "Maybe. Anyway, if the big game hunter theory turns out to be true then there's probably a settlement not too far from here. I'm not seeing any tire tracks or hoof prints in the dirt. So unless they took a helicopter or something like that, they must've come here on foot. Hold on." Daniel got down on his hands and knees, looking through the grass and dirt. For a second, Jack forgot that Daniel was part of SG-1 and only saw the archeologist that they had picked up back when the had turned the Stargate on for the first time. This was him in his element.

"Ah-ha," he said triumphantly, pointing to dented grass and marks in the dirt. "Footprints. Two pairs of them." Jack approached, kneeling next to Daniel. There were indeed a pair of footprints marking the soil. They were shallow and rather on the small side. "If I had to guess, I'd say whoever left these were young, women, or both," Daniel said. He leaned forward to one. The pattern of the print was instantly recognizable to Jack, the grooved mark that a boot made. "I think this is our hunter," Daniel said. "And this is...uh." He stopped, staring down in disbelief.

Jack leaned forward. The second pair of prints was incomplete. Two sections made up each footprint, the front of the foot and a small circle where the heel should be. Jack looked at Daniel. "Daniel? I don't mean to make assumptions, but is person #2 running around a forest in high heels?" Daniel nodded dumbly. "Now I'm no fashion expert, but I could've sworn Sam prefers boots when she goes hiking and I thought that was the norm. Or is there some historical precedent for roughing it in your finery?"

"Uh," Daniel said, in that tone of voice that told Jack that he was about to get a history lesson. "History does have a lot of odd things being done to women's feet. China began practicing foot binding on court dancers in the Ten Kingdoms period and it spread throughout all of their society until this century, for example. And in the Wild West, heeled boots were used for practical purposes, you can still see that in a lot of modern farmers. High heels were actually commonly worn by men in the Victorian era. Though they weren't quite this high." He brushed some loose dust out of the print. "This looks like a heel you would wear for fashion back on Earth."

"So this is new to see in the forest," Jack said. "You think boots was the one with the rifle?"

Daniel shrugged. "Hard to say, archeology isn't forensic science. Though you don't need to be an expert in either to see which way they ended up going." He pointed. "That way." Jack nodded. Half an hour, maybe an hour, in that direction, and then they would double back for the Stargate. If they found any settlements then they would make contact, if not they would return to Earth and requisition supplies for a long term away mission.

"Colonel? DHD is clear and undamaged." Jack smiled and turned to see Sam and Teal'c emerging from the cave. "We have a way back good to go," Sam said. "What's the plan?"

"Daniel here has found evidence that the locals have a decent level of technological development and they headed off that way," Jack said, pointing in the same direction that had already been identified. "We're gonna try the usual meet and greet. No signs of anything particularly nasty on this planet except bears. Unless you've got anything for us Teal'c."

All eyes turned to the Jaffa defector. "Apophis never displayed particular interest in this world," he said, taking in the environment. "It was lost many centuries ago, but none of the System Lords appeared to be upset over it. I only ever heard it referred to as a waste that we were well rid of."

Sam gave Jack a thoughtful look. "Is there any chance that the Goa'uld had another rebellion here and that's what resulted in the Gate being buried? It's not like the Goa'uld to just give up control of worlds where there are people living on them."

"Maybe," Jack said. If that was the case it would be a slam dunk into turning these people into allies against the Goa'uld. "Well Sam, you can always ask them yourself. Hour-long march that way, I say. Let's see if we can make any friends today." All of SG-1 readied up, their MP5s in hand, moving in the direction the footprints had led.

They had taken ten steps when a noise echoed in the distance and across the landscape. A noise Jack was all too familiar with. Gunfire. And from the sound of it, some very heavy weapons were being fired. Sam turned to face him, concern plastered over her face. "Sir? Orders?"

Instinct took over, instructs honed from a year of dealing with the Goa'uld and so many more in the service. "Double time it, but stay low. I want to figure out who's shooting who out there before we get dragged into it." He received a trio of nods as safeties were flipped off on their weapons. They doubled their pace, Daniel noticeably going a little red in the face to keep up with the two soldiers and Jaffa, but he was able to do so without too much trouble. He was slowly turning into a soldier via circumstance, not trade.

There were no signs of active settlements as they moved through the woods, just more crumbling ruins that Jack could tell that Daniel would want to come back and examine in detail the second they had an all-clear. The gunfire was getting louder, they were close enough for Jack to realize that there weren't that many shooters, but that the weapons being fired were particularly heavy. His mind went back to the .50 cal that Daniel had found earlier and wondered if their big game hunter was still in the area. And if they hadn't been out just hunting a grizzly that had almost eaten someone. Maybe Teal'c hadn't been in on the know with what the Gou'ald had done with this world, or maybe they had realized that the gate was working again too. Something was up.

Before too long, the trees began to thin and the ground became rockier. Pushing through, they found themselves on the edge of a massive cliff that looked down over a ravine. For some reason, a bunch of idiots had thought that the inside of a massive gap in the earth had been a good place to build more ruins, and these were much bigger than the tiny buildings they had seen back in the forests. Even Jack, no expert in architecture, could tell that these dwarfed even some of the bigger discoveries back on Earth. Stretching upward from their stable footings along the edges of the ravine, they had to be at least a hundred meters tall, with stone bridges connecting them. Frankly, it looked like death by falling that was waiting to happen.

All of this only held Jack's attention for a second before something else grabbed it. The bird that was flying through the ravine, its wings wide and its beak open in a deafening caw. Jack called it a bird because it was the closest word in his vocabulary that he could think of. Privately, he thought that the word was woefully inadequate. He didn't remember ever seeing a bird that was as black as a starless night sky except for a bone plate on its face that was lined with glowing, red veins. He also couldn't remember ever seeing a bird that was, give or take, around the size of a jumbo jet yet was diving downward with the speed and grace of a Tomcat. He was pretty sure he would remember seeing a bird that shot out its feathers when it flapped its wings, particularly if they did so with enough force that the stalk of the feathers penetrated solid stone. And yet, something just like that was arcing through the valley, leaving nearly everything below it riddled with feathers the size of trucks.

"Daniel? This is the part where you say something that goes way over my head but reassures you and maybe Sam that this is totally explainable," Jack said, not taking his eyes off of the giant whatever the hell that thing was. Daniel was hardly a bird doctor, but surely he had come across a few when he was dusting off ancient civilizations. That's what Jack thought before he heard an "uh" from behind him. It wasn't a "well technically" uh, it was an "I have no idea what I'm looking at" uh. Jack rarely heard that particular kind of "uh" coming from Daniel, but when it did, nothing good ever followed.

"Jack, I have no idea what that thing is, or even how it's possible," Daniel said.

"He's right sir," Sam said. "Something that big shouldn't be able to fly, heck, something that big shouldn't even be able to stand up. According to the square-cube law, it should be collapsing under its own weight." Even when SG-1 was stumped and confused they always managed to find time to spit out a bunch of mumbo jumbo, it was the worst of both worlds. "Sir, orders? I'm not sure our weapons will do anything to that. Even with Teal'c's staff, we might only be able to inflict superficial damage, at best."

Jack couldn't argue with that conclusion. When you saw a tank, you didn't just ping away at it with a pistol. You got an AT weapon, a tank of your own, or an airstrike. He wasn't sure if a missile would be able to properly lock onto something like a bird, an Abrams tank wouldn't fit through the stargate, and the logistics of fueling and launching a bird on another planet were just laughable. Maybe the Gou'ald could deploy death gliders to handle something like this, but America couldn't.

"Teal'c?" he said, not taking his eyes off of the bird as it turned and made another pass at the ravine. "Is there any chance the Gou'ald left this world behind because the animals on it were too much of a nuisance?"

There was a pause before Teal'c replied. There was some comfort to be had in that, it made Jack feel just a little bit better about the horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach. "I have not heard of such an event occurring before, but the circumstances presented on this world are...unique. It is possible. The Gou'ald have previously abandoned colonization efforts due to inadequate atmosphere, lack of exploitable resources, and climate shifts into ice ages. Even for them, resources are not infinite."

"Uh-huh," Jack said dumbly. "Right. Ok. Here's what we're doing. We are getting the hell out of there before that thing spots us and pins us against a tree with one of its feathers. Assuming it doesn't just eat us." Most likely, it would be able to swallow them whole if it tried. "Or take us back to its nest for the kiddies. We go back through the Stargate and tell Hammond to never send another SG team to this planet again.

"Copy that," Sam said. "Still, no sign of whoever was shooting, I-" but she trailed off. She leaned over the edge, her eyes narrowing. "Oh my God. Colonel, there are children down there!" Jack heard what she said, but his brain didn't seem to register it. It seemed too absurd to be true, more akin to a drunk soldier loudly proclaiming that they were Bill Clinton. Despite this, instincts took over. Sam was right. It was hard to tell from this distance with the naked eye, but four, brightly dressed teenagers were in the midst of the ruins that the bird was dive-bombing. The cracks of gunfire, now that he stopped and concentrated, were coming from them He had no idea what people so young were doing with firepower so heavy, but it didn't matter. Visibility was poor, but he could tell that they were boxed in with no way to escape that the bird couldn't easily devastate.

"Sir, orders?" Sam was looking at him, her knuckles growing white with how tightly she was gripping her MP5. Jack could tell that Daniel and Teal'c were eyeballing him too. The smart thing to do would be to accept that those kids were most likely goners. That nothing they had could reliably hurt that thing, and that they should cut their losses and run for it.

"Light it up." But then again he couldn't remember General Hammond ever calling him smart. Then again, it said a lot about all of SG-1 that they obeyed his orders without question. Semi-auto bursts of fire accompanied by the discharge of an alien energy weapon joined the noise of the weapons already being fired at the bird. He, Sam, and Daniel had all taken kneeling positions as they fired, while Teal'c remained standing. Jack felt a pang of pride that he would most likely never admit out of sheer embarrassment. Or, more likely, because they would never get the chance to.

The MP5 had a maximum effective range of a couple hundred meters and he had a sneaking suspicion that the bird was dancing around the edge of that. It was hard to tell if they were even hitting it, SG-1 didn't load their weapons with tracer rounds, they weren't a dedicated combat unit. The only certainty they had was the orange blasts from Teal'c's staff weapon, once of which very clearly arced forward and hit the bird square in the back as it made another pass. It let out an echoing caw that rattled Jack's ears, even from this distance. Ok, Gou'ald weapons could hurt it, that was a start.

Still, more than a little bit of panic was starting to course through Jack. Everything about this situation just spelled out bad news. The kids had, somehow, clambered to the top of pillars and were firing their weapons, producing some truly odd looking tracers, at the bird. He had no idea what had driven them to take up that position, any advantages the elevation gave them were negated by the lack of cover and the fact that they were fighting something that could fly. It was a bad situation, a bad situation all around.

"Sir! On our six!" In long trained movements, Jack took a quick peek behind his back while still keeping his weapon at the ready. Then he saw the half dozen bears that were making a mad beeline for them. Bigger than any bear Jack had ever seen, they were the same jet black as the bird, complete with nearly identical white skull plates. The distance between the bears and SG-1 was a hundred meters at most, and it was shrinking at a rapid rate.

"Oh for crying-behind us people! We found Pooh-Bear!" Swinging his SMG around and taking note of the speed of their new contacts, he switched it to full auto. "Spray em!" The careful, selected shots of semi-auto vanished, replaced with the roar of automatic fire. He and Sam were the first, while Daniel lagged a second or two behind but joined them with enthusiasm not long after. A little too enthusiastic, even with full auto you had to maintain some form of trigger discipline, Daniel simply jammed down on his trigger with no remorse. He dumped his entire magazine into the rightmost bear within a matter of seconds, and while it crumpled to the ground as a result, his weapon went silent not long after.

With Daniel taking the right, he and Sam focused on the left. With well-drilled fire discipline, they picked separate targets and riddled them with bullets. Normal fire doctrine would've called for aiming for the torso, where there were more vital organs and a larger hitbox. That didn't work so well here, something as big as a bear would take time to die when shot with 9mm rounds, time they didn't have. So he and Carter both aimed for the face, emptying half of their mags into their respective targets. Whatever these animals were, they were dedicated enough to keep charging forward even as rounds tore into their faces, ripping off massive chunks that should have killed any animals. Despite this, a few more bullets found their mark and they joined Daniel's kill, sprawling onto the ground. With a confirmed kill each, they rounded on the three surviving ones.

This proved to be unneeded. Teal'c had been quick on the draw with his staff weapon, firing a snapshot the second Jack had given the order to switch targets. Orange energy struck the throat of one of the bears, separating its head from the rest of its body in a single, not so clean tear. Switching targets with machine-like precision, Teal'c sent another blast that caught a second bear right in the mouth. Smoke trailed out as it crashed into the ground. The final one reached melee range and lunged at Teal'c, evidently deciding he was the biggest threat. The last of Sam and Jack's mags, combined with a third blast, send it sprawling, prone and limp, just short of Teal'c.

"Daniel, you and I are spending more time at the range when we get back," Jack said teasingly. It was a little joke to try and take his mind off of how utterly miserable this planet was, they had never encountered wildlife this vicious. One threat had been dealt with, now they had to get back to the bird. Ejecting his magazine, he reloaded along with Sam and Daniel. As they cocked their weapons, however, the cliffside shook. "What was that?" he asked, not certain he wanted the answer.

The answer came in the form of a loud caw, resonating from the very edge of the cliff. The bird was right under them, and it sounded stationary. "Ok, best chance we're gonna get at this. Everyone, full auto over the cliff. Teal'c, try and get it in the eye, even something that big's gotta be soft there. If we-" but he was cut off by the cliff shaking again, along with the noise of rocks being snapped in half. It sounded as if the bird was flying up the cliffside, smashing through it as it went. "Ah crap, I think it's coming for us! Ready up!"

SG-1 aimed their weapons, waiting for the bird. Outrunning it wasn't likely possible, they would have to pray for a lucky shot in the eyes. Jack's fingers tensed as the smashing noises got louder. Then he saw it, the head of the bird poking over the cliff. A few scattered shots went off before Jack saw it. "Hold your fire! Hold your fire!" He couldn't believe it. The bird wasn't flying up the cliff. It was being dragged. A young girl, she couldn't be older than fifteen, was pulling a bright red scythe that was bigger than she was, the blade tucked under the bird's neck. Then, with a loud bang, she rocketed upward, clearing the top of the bird, the blade slicing clean through, decapitating it.

The girl landed firmly on the top of the cliff, her scythe over her shoulders, as the headless body fell back into the ravine. Slowly, the girl stood up, smiling. Then she saw SG-1. She let out a loud yelp, stumbling backwards a few steps before finding her footing. "Um. Hi?" she said uncertainly, waving at them. The scythe, unless Jack was seeing things, had quite a few firearm mechanics in it. A magazine and trigger near the base, while a barrel was pointing out the top of the blade. It looked impossible to lift, and yet the girl was holding it in her hands with ease. This, combined with the red and black skirt, top, and cape, made for a surreal experience. "I'm Ruby Rose. Did Professor Ozpin send you to keep an eye on us?" She peeked behind them. "Those Ursas didn't give you any trouble, did they?"

"Uh, the bears? No, we-" Jack said, glancing at the bears. His voice trailed off as he saw their bodies, or rather, what little was left of them. They were disappearing, bits and pieces of them falling off and blowing away in the wind like dust. If Jack was being generous, there was about a quarter of each body left. "What the-is that normal on this planet?"

"Uh, yeah?" Ruby said, looking confused. "Grimm always do that." She tilted her head. "Have you never been outside of a city before?"

"I live in the suburbs, thank you," Jack said. As he spoke, he remembered he should probably do the usual. "Listen, this might sound a little weird, but we're not actually from this planet, we're from a world called Earth. We came here through a portal called a Stargate to look for potential allies and make contact. Uh. So nice to meet you." He couldn't help but focus on just how impossibly big that scythe was. "Mind filling us in with what's going on around here?"

Ruby, however, had jumped back with a yelp of surprise. "You guys are aliens!?"

"No, we're human, just like you." He glanced at Teal'c. "Mostly." Well, this was better than the natives assuming they were gods, that had gotten tired and annoying after a while. It was nice to speak to someone who had an understanding of other planets and alien life for a change.

"There's a bit of history to this," Sam said helpfully. Jack promptly stopped talking, happy to let Sam fill the void. "All humans were native to our planet, Earth. Some call us the Tau'ri, it means the first ones. But a long time ago, back when we only had bronze tools, aliens called the Gou'ald spread Tau'ri all across the galaxy to act as slaves. That's where your ancestors came from, Earth."

Ruby gasped, looking down at her hands. "I'm an alien?"

"No," Jack said, feeling annoyed.

"I mean, technically," Daniel said. Jack shot him a glare. "I mean, if you consider the literal definition of alien in the interplanetary sense, this isn't the native planet for humans. We're aliens to every planet that isn't-"

"Daniel, not now," Jack said. "Listen, all you need to know is you're a human, I'm a human, we're all humans except for Teal'c, and even then he's mostly human." Ruby blinked, looking at Teal'c in confusion, her gaze focusing on the golden symbol in his forehead. Jack supposed she was wondering how someone could be mostly human.

"I am Jaffa," he said, noticing her gaze. "The Jaffa were once human but were changed by the Gou'ald to better serve their needs. Both as soldiers, and as incubators for their young. I carry one even as we speak."

There was a long, awkward pause. "You're pregnant?" Ruby said with uncertainty.

"I-" Jack started, but he trailed off. When he stopped and thought about it, Ruby wasn't exactly wrong. Teal'c was carrying a baby in his stomach. Still though. "He's got a slug in him. The Gou'ald are slugs. Parasites really, they can't live without a host. They live in Jaffa while they're still little brats until they're big enough to take on a regular human. When that happens…" he trailed off for a moment. He couldn't help but remember Skaara. Maybe Daniel was thinking of Sha're. "When that happens, they move into a regular human. Jaffa keep their free will. Hosts to adult Gou'ald don't. They only see us as livestock for their needs."

Ruby looked back and forth across all of them. The initial shock of the whole space thing seemed to have worn off. Concern was now the dominant expression on her face. "So...these slug people are the bad guys?" Jack nodded. A refreshingly simple way of putting it. "But how come they aren't here? And how did you get here?"

"That would be the Stargate," Sam said. "The Gou'ald have ships that can travel between star systems, but they rely on a series of portals called Stargates for quick passage between planets. Stargates don't work if they're buried, which yours was until it was recently unearthed."

"Ten bucks says Big Bird did it," Jack said, gesturing in the direction of the cliff. "Could've flapped his wings and caused a rockslide."

Sam nodded. "Maybe. But as for how we got here, Earth rebelled against the Gou'ald a long time ago, and we buried our Stargate so they couldn't come back. We unearthed it a few thousand years later, and now we're using it to explore planets to look for allies against the Gou'ald." She gave a warm smile. Jack was starting to wonder if he should be talking at all or just let Sam handle it, she had always been good with kids. "Is there anyone you know that we could talk to? A local leader that we could see about getting support from?"

Ruby's face lit up at once. "Professor Ozpin might be able to help you! He's the headmaster at Beacon Academy!"

Sam nodded, keeping her smile up, but Jack could see just a little bit of tension. Jack understood it, they needed a mayor, governor, or general, not a principal. "We're looking for someone who might be at the center of government or commander of armed forces," Sam said warmly.

"Yup!" Ruby said happily. "Like I said, Beacon Academy. It's where we train Huntresses and Huntsmen. Like me!" She affectionately patted her giant scythe. "It's our job to fight Grimm and he's the best of the best. He's perfect for you."

"I'm sorry, Grimm?" Jack said. "Mind filling us in? And while we're at it, meaning no offense, but Teal'c here has muscles that would make bodybuilders jealous and I don't think he could lift that scythe as easily as you are. How are you doing that?"

"Aura," Ruby said simply. "And Grimm? They're the big black animals that are all over Remnant? The Ursa you killed and the Nevermore my team took out are Grimm." She tilted her head. "Do you not have them where you came from?" Jack mentally cataloged that this planet was apparently called Remnant. Odd name.

"We got bears, not any that are literal pitch black though, and they don't turn to dust when they die either," Jack said. "And birds don't get any bigger than a bald eagle. And what do you mean Aura? Isn't that a hippie thing?" Of all the planets he had been to, this was shaping up to be the weirdest.

"Aura's kind of like, the soul?" Ruby said. Jack fought back a groan. Once, just once, he wanted to have a first contact where religion didn't get brought up. "Except it's manifested so you're tougher and stronger. And most people with Aura can do something cool called a Semblance. Here, check out mine!" Jack was about to interject when Ruby, right before him, turned into a red blob that sped towards him. He barely had time to take a step back in surprise before the blob came to a stop, Ruby now right in front of him, smiling proudly. "I'm super fast! And my sister hits harder the more she gets hit."

"Ok," Jack said awkwardly. He had totally pegged this planet wrong. He had been expecting giant monsters, not something that Superman would fit right into. "Uh. Was this something you were born with?"

"Nope. Got it from training," Ruby said, taking a few steps back to give Jack some room. "Though Aura users can active Aura in other people. It's really useful. It can ever protect you from harm. Heck, you could probably shoot me right now and I'd be fine." There was a pause and a slightly scared look crossed her face. "Um, please don't."

"Yeah, I was gonna take your word for it," Jack said. His muzzle was pointed at the ground out of habit, but he made extra sure that he was maintaining muzzle discipline after that. "So this soul power thing can be taught? You just need to learn it?"

"Yup!" Ruby said. "You wanna talk to Professor Ozpin about it? You can talk to him about the Gou...alds? I'm sure he'd be happy to help you."

Jack held up his hands in a "fine by me" gesture. "You don't hear me complaining."

"All right! One second," Ruby said. With a twirl, her scythe somehow collapsed in on itself and she snuggly slid onto her back. After, she talked over to the edge of the cliff, cupped her hands, and shouted "Everyone! We have company! Can you get up here!?" There was a muffled shout in response, followed by a series of bangs that steadily grew louder. A girl that looked to be a couple of years older than Ruby soared up over the cliffside, punching downward as she did. The end of a bright yellow gauntlet she was wearing blared, making a sound much like a shotgun, propelling her even higher before she descended and landed with a thump next to Ruby.

Around the same time, two more girls appeared on the edge of a cliffside. One swung up over the edge, holding the oddest looking grappling hook Jack had ever seen, while the other seemed to slide up the cliff with the precision and grace of an ice skater. Jack wasn't sure to make out of all of them. They were the teenagers that SG-1 had spotted earlier but now that they were close Jack could see what they were wearing. He wasn't even sure how to begin to describe it.

The one who had skated up the cliff was the easiest, just a blue/white dress and heels, with snow-white hair done into a side ponytail. She had a refined, dignified look to her, but had a vague look about her that just screamed "haughty" to Jack. The grappler was on the opposite end of the color spectrum wearing some sort of sleeveless outfit that had a bit of white but was mainly black. A black bow was tied neatly on top of her head, long, free-flowing hair of the same color, and her golden eyes were carefully looking SG-1 up and down. The final newcomer was wearing something that Jack would expect out of a club, a brown jacket that exposed her midriff and shorts that barely covered his thighs. That paled in comparison to the utterly ridiculous amount of bright, blonde hair that looked as if it would reach the back of her knees after another month or two or growing.

"Are they Beacon staff?" the white-haired girl asked, shooting Ruby a skeptical look.

"We're explorers," Sam said, "It's a long story. We were told that there was a professor that we could talk to?"

"Sure thing!" the blonde said, walking over and cheerfully offering her hand to Jack. "I'm Yang, nice to meet you." Jack took the hand and was promptly shaken so hard that he wondered if his arm had been dislocated. "You've already met my sister Ruby, and our traveling buddies Weiss and Blake." She pointed to the white-haired girl and black-haired girl respectively. The black-haired one was staying notably silent, sizing them up. Jack was pretty sure that he knew the type.

"Well, we'd be happy to show you where to go, I'm fairly certain we've passed initiation by this point," Weiss said, sounding as if she was trying to hide how annoyed she was. She wasn't doing a very good job.

"Goodie," Jack said. "Carter? How about you and I go with them. Daniel, head back through the Stargate and let Hammond know we've made contact."

"Stargate?" Blake said, speaking for the first time. "What's that?" Jack bit back a sigh as he began to explain, hoping he wouldn't have to do it too many times today.

At the end of it all. Another day, another planet. Though this one was proving to be...different. These girls were only teenagers, yet the things they could do were nothing short of remarkable. Borderline impossible. And he had a feeling they had only scratched the surface.

XXXXX

Author's Note: Fun fact, I hadn't watched Stargate before I got this prompt and work and other conflicting interests mean I only am in early season 2 (which is around where this takes place) but it's looking interesting so far. This'll be thrown on the pile of things that would make interesting full stories, particularly when there are comparisons to be made between Ozpin and Gou'ald.

I would like to thank my Patrons, SuperFeatherYoshi, xXNanamiXx, RaptorusMaximus, Davis Swinney, Ryan Van Schaack, ChaosSpartan575, and LordofNaught for their amazing support.


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